RE: What happened to the Rallye? PH Blog

[CampDavid]

The Staffer's 306 is being restored here:

http://www.306gti6.com/forum/showthread.php?id=159...

It seems to be coming along.

[jonah35]

Years ago id have said at least no one is hurt. Now I think that you're daft for clearly driving too quickly in an old banger that could have killed someone and you're the type of person not needed on our roads!

I'm getting old.

[amancalledrob]

C.A.R. said:

Did your airbags go off? Mine didn't, which is a bit concerning.

Airbags can themselves cause injury, which is why they only go off if they really need to. If your face didn't hit anything, you didn't need an airbag.

[CampDavid]

[cat with a hat]

vrooom said:

how can you crash a fwd car ?

Lift off oversteer..

Heavy accelerating in the 5-7k range followed by a heavy lift off the throttle as you are turning will cause the back of the car to try and overtake the front. This is amplified if you have st tires on the back, if its wet and when you hit the brakes.

The best advice is to know about it, understand it and test it in a safe environment so your automatic reaction if it starts to happen is to accelerate out of trouble.

I drove a lightly modified and stripped out 306gti6 for a few years and it was great fun on twisty roads.

Edited by cat with a hat on Saturday 12th July 10:34

[s m]

cat with a hat said:

vrooom said:

how can you crash a fwd car ?

Lift off oversteer..

Heavy accelerating in the 5-7k range followed by a heavy lift off the throttle as you are turning will cause the back of the car to try and overtake the front.

[aw51 121565]

Welshwonder said:

aw51 121565 said:

Thanks for posting this pic... My 309 has always felt as if the rear brakes come on first - it needs a new handbrake cable plus new shoes in the very near future (all the parts are here, I'm just lazy but the car is off the road), so I'll have a tinker with the rear brake load sensing valves (which the Haynes Book Of Economy With The Truth overlooks apart from a brief mention in passing) as well .

The 309 doesn't have a load sensing valve. Buy better front brakes!

Thanks , I've still not done the job anyway - but the rear brakes 'grab' and the back end drops at the slightest touch of the brake pedal (or they did when I last drove the car in what must have been February). I'll see what's under there at some point...

Front brake pads and discs changed (for Pagids as I recall) a couple of years ago, while the car stopped a lot better it made no difference to this 'back end drop' issue .

[Mr Whippy]

cat with a hat said:

accelerate out of trouble

Best thing to do is not drive at 5k+ rpm with so much lateral g on the road to begin with, that a throttle lift would cause you problems...

We can all get caught out, but you're asking for it at high speed at high rpm where you can't see the road ahead enough to be clear to not rule out a sudden lift of throttle.


I'm not sure but the 306 P3's all had EBD too, so the safest option in those is to brake hard and steer where you want to go and it should generally go where you want it to go... kinda like emergency ESP under brakes only... which is nice

[WarrenG]

I will never suffer budget tyres on cars again. Buy second-hand and the car has mixed brands, cheap tyres or just uneven wear and it has to be a new set of boots and an alignment.
The car that finally hammered that home was a nice 205gti that had the absolutely cheapest hardest budget tyres I have ever seen, and I thought - great, I'll just wear out a bit more of all this tread before I buy some good ones! The very first wet day I drove out in it, I stacked it into a roundabout after the slightest touch of brakes. All my own fault of course - too fast for conditions, not enough care. Luckily all I broke was two axles and a wheel; no road furniture or 3rd parties. So it was a lesson.

[Mercury00]

jonah35 said:

Years ago id have said at least no one is hurt. Now I think that you're daft for clearly driving too quickly in an old banger that could have killed someone and you're the type of person not needed on our roads!

I'm getting old.

No, you're right. It also sets a bad example for PH.

[torqueofthedevil]

It's strange because I used to have a 306 gti6 as a track and hill climb car and everyone went on about lift off over steer and a habit of loosing the back end....and it never happened once. However hard I drive it. Even when purposefully trying to unsettle the back end to help get around corners it wouldn't budge!

[Welshwonder]

aw51 121565 said:

Thanks , I've still not done the job anyway - but the rear brakes 'grab' and the back end drops at the slightest touch of the brake pedal (or they did when I last drove the car in what must have been February). I'll see what's under there at some point...

Front brake pads and discs changed (for Pagids as I recall) a couple of years ago, while the car stopped a lot better it made no difference to this 'back end drop' issue .

Might be a dead master cylinder. Buy one for a Mk2 Golf GTi - same on the outside but slightly bigger piston. Should be about £30 new.

[PhillipM]

torqueofthedevil said:

It's strange because I used to have a 306 gti6 as a track and hill climb car and everyone went on about lift off over steer and a habit of loosing the back end....and it never happened once. However hard I drive it. Even when purposefully trying to unsettle the back end to help get around corners it wouldn't budge!

Lets face it, a lot of them have worn out suspension and/or st tyres, yet it's the car that gets the blame when the oblivious owner stacks it.

[Mr Whippy]

torqueofthedevil said:

It's strange because I used to have a 306 gti6 as a track and hill climb car and everyone went on about lift off over steer and a habit of loosing the back end....and it never happened once. However hard I drive it. Even when purposefully trying to unsettle the back end to help get around corners it wouldn't budge!

Same here, I found the old 405 was worse in this regard by a long way, but even that you had to purposely be a dick AND not respond to the impending doom to let it go around on you... which by all accounts happened slowly in that car I think.

I just put it down to you naturally responding to the car in such a way that it subdues the causes of over-steer propagating. But so many people are not used to these things and so when they feel it happen all those natural subtle movements that work in self-preservation just are not there and around the car goes.


It's either crap tyres, badly maintained cars, or just really bad driving.

Dave

[MissChief]

On my old 306 GTI-6 it only happened twice. Each time catching me by surprise slightly but I managed to save it. I did purposefully try it many times but it never seemed to want to happen.

[Shadden]

I bought Matt's red rallye and brought it back to life!! Had a good few happy years with it and still have it!! Great little car.

[Matt Bird]

Shadden said:

I bought Matt's red rallye and brought it back to life!! Had a good few happy years with it and still have it!! Great little car.

This has made my week! Excellent news. You're enjoying it? What needed doing?


Matt

[*Fletch*]

PhillipM said:

Lets face it, a lot of them have worn out suspension and/or st tyres, yet it's the car that gets the blame when the oblivious owner stacks it.

Agreed, worn beam mounts, and crap tyres all exacerbated the oversteer near the limit. It was harder to provoke with decent tyres and sound suspension.

[lyonspride]

I had a 306 XSI 2.0, that was a very tail happy car, but it was controllable..... That was until in my naive youth I was conned by a certain tyre exhaust chain into thinking it needed new front shocks, this totally ruined the car, the front end was too soft, it would try to spin just taking a corner at normal speeds, i'd go so far as to say they made it lethal, the garage refused to do anything as they'd fitted recommended OEM replacement shocks. I saved up and got a sports suspension kit, this was much better, but but the car still never handled properly ever again.

I've concluded that once people start f**king with the suspension on these cars, it's game over, you'll never get it the same again. The manufacturer spends millions designing a great car, some idiot spends £30 on a cheap angle grinder and chops the springs, a real shame.